When you’re looking for an espresso maker, you have a few different options. Electric espresso makers are popular choices, and they make creating your own espresso drinks quick and easy. This type of machine feeds pressurized water through a series of tubes in the device, heats it up and then feeds it through compacted grounds. Most electric espresso machines include milk frothing wands, which use steam to create delicious foamy milk or cream that’s ideal for cappuccinos or lattes. Many machines are fully automatic, so there isn’t much of a learning curve involved. A few even include built-in coffee mills, offering fresh coffee with zero effort.

Although it's very easy to use — you just fill the portafilter with grounds, attach it to the machine, and press the button to start — The Gaggia Classic isn't as flexible or intuitive as the Breville Barista Express. The user manual is less detailed, too, so you have to have a basic idea of what you're doing or browse the internet for tips. The machine has a one-year warranty if you run into problems.

Percolators began to be developed from the mid-nineteenth century. In the United States, James H. Mason of Massachusetts patented an early percolator design in 1865. An Illinois farmer named Hanson Goodrich is generally credited with patenting the modern percolator. Goodrich's patent was granted on August 16, 1889, and his patent description varies little from the stovetop percolators sold today. With the percolator design, water is heated in a boiling pot with a removable lid, until the heated water is forced through a metal tube into a brew basket containing coffee. The extracted liquid drains from the brew basket, where it drips back into the pot. This process is continually repeated during the brewing cycle until the liquid passing repeatedly through the grounds is sufficiently steeped. A clear sight chamber in the form of a transparent knob on the lid of the percolator enables the user to judge when the coffee has reached the proper color and strength.

The impact of science and technological advances as a motif in post-war design was eventually felt in the manufacture and marketing of coffee and coffee-makers. Consumer guides emphasized the ability of the device to meet standards of temperature and brewing time, and the ratio of soluble elements between brew and grounds. The industrial chemist Peter Schlumbohm expressed the scientific motif most purely in his "Chemex" coffeemaker, which from its initial marketing in the early 1940s used the authority of science as a sales tool, describing the product as "the Chemist's way of making coffee", and discussing at length the quality of its product in the language of the laboratory: "the funnel of the CHEMEX creates ideal hydrostatic conditions for the unique... Chemex extraction." Schlumbohm's unique brewer, a single Pyrex vessel shaped to hold a proprietary filter cone, resembled nothing more than a piece of laboratory equipment, and surprisingly became popular for a time in the otherwise heavily automated, technology-obsessed 1950s household.
Throughout the latter part of the 20th century, a number of inventors patented various coffeemaker designs using an automated form of the drip brew method. Subsequent designs have featured changes in heating elements, spray head, and brew-basket design, as well as the addition of timers and clocks for automatic-start, water filtration, filter and carafe design, and even built-in coffee grinding mechanisms.
That said, it’s not as elegant to use as the OXO machines. (Nor is it as nice to look at. One tester described its tall, bulbous body and squat carafe as “UFO-like.”) Take its eight-button controls, for example, which you use to toggle among brew modes, scroll up and down within the menu, and engage a manual brewing feature. Programming it to start brewing at a certain time was about as intuitive as setting an alarm on a clock radio — easy enough, but more technical than sleek. OXO definitely feels like the future; Behmor is more, “If it ain’t broke, why fix it?”
We've researched everything you need to know about buying a shiny new espresso machine for your home and we've combed through the details and reviews for dozens of machines so you don't have to. Before we get into the best espresso machines you can buy for your home, let's take a look at all the key terms and information that you need to know to make an informed purchase.

If tinkering is what you’re most excited about, we recommend the Behmor Brazen Plus Customizable Temperature Control Brew System. This is a drip machine that takes its job seriously. It performed the very best in our out-of-the-box taste testing, but still gives you the opportunity to play around with different variables, from water temperature to pre-infusion times. At around $200, it’s on-par with the OXO 9-Cup price-wise, but is definitely not as nice to look at or use, with a tall, bulbous body, squat carafe, and an eight-button programmable interface that reminded us of a digital alarm clock.

Bring home this Cuisinart PerfecTemp 12-Cup Thermal Programmable Coffee Maker, which due to its dimensions can fit into small spaces in a neat manner. The coffee machine can be programmed, as per your personal preferences to make the best cup of coffee. The lid at the top of the coffee maker seals in the aroma of the coffee, whilst you brew it. The PerfecTemp 12-Cup Thermal Programmable Coffee Maker from Cuisinart is made from excellent quality materials, which lends it a sturdy and durable...

With these incredible coffee pots from HSN, you'll have an amazing way to start your day. Whether you're serious about your java, or just drink the occasional cup when you're feeling tired, you'll enjoy brewing with these premium coffee and espresso makers. Delight in the richness of coffee from freshly ground beans prepared in a French press, or make silky smooth cappuccinos at home for a fraction of what they cost at that trendy cafe. Treat friends and family to a delicious cup after a large home cooked meal. With a coffee espresso machine from this collection, your kitchen will be the hottest coffeeshop on the block.

Pierce's design was later improved by U.S. appliance engineers Ivar Jepson, Ludvik Koci, and Eric Bylund of Sunbeam in the late 1930s. They altered the heating chamber and eliminated the recessed well which was hard to clean. They also made several improvements to the filtering mechanism. Their improved design of plated metals, styled by industrial designer Alfonso Iannelli, became the famous Sunbeam Coffeemaster line of automated vacuum coffee makers (Models C-20, C-30, C40, and C-50). The Coffeemaster vacuum brewer was sold in large numbers in the United States during the years immediately following World War I.

It’s not that cone filters won’t make a great cup of coffee — the OXO On 9-Cup still ranked fifth out of 10 in our taste test. But flat bottoms generally allow for the grounds to be more evenly extracted and increase the coffee’s flavor. (It’s no coincidence our other three recommendations have flat-bottom brew baskets). You may have to do a little more tweaking to get this coffee maker’s brew to the best it can be, and that’s the other reason we like the 12-cupper more. This smaller version doesn’t let you tinker with water temperature.

Throughout the latter part of the 20th century, a number of inventors patented various coffeemaker designs using an automated form of the drip brew method. Subsequent designs have featured changes in heating elements, spray head, and brew-basket design, as well as the addition of timers and clocks for automatic-start, water filtration, filter and carafe design, and even built-in coffee grinding mechanisms.
This product is their smallest K-Mini™ K15 Single-Serve K-Cup Pod Coffee Maker, but it still delivers the delicious taste and reliable quality you expect. Its small size ensures the K-Mini™ coffee maker is perfect for kitchens with limited counter space, college dorms, and other small spaces. Its portable design makes it easy to transport anywhere you go, so your favorite beverages are never far away. Whether brewing coffee, tea, iced tea, or hot cocoa, the product makes single-cup brewing...

Once you start brewing, it makes a really, really good pot of coffee. Our taste test revealed the OXO On 12-Cup coffee was “dark and strong” and appealed to the more traditionalist coffee palates. The great flavor comes from the brewing process. The OXO machines have wide shower heads with multiple ports through which water streams, dispersing it evenly throughout the brew basket. Lots of other coffee makers spout water through just one hole, or through shower heads with a smaller radius, which can increase the chances of uneven extraction.

To ensure that our customers get the best coffee makers for their needs, our expert team here at Seattle Coffee Gear tests and reviews all items in our inventory. With us, you can be sure that you’re making a quality investment, no matter which coffee maker you choose. Use the links below for further assistance in the buying process, and shop with us today!
Bring home this Cuisinart PerfecTemp 12-Cup Thermal Programmable Coffee Maker, which due to its dimensions can fit into small spaces in a neat manner. The coffee machine can be programmed, as per your personal preferences to make the best cup of coffee. The lid at the top of the coffee maker seals in the aroma of the coffee, whilst you brew it. The PerfecTemp 12-Cup Thermal Programmable Coffee Maker from Cuisinart is made from excellent quality materials, which lends it a sturdy and durable...
For example, if your coffee tastes a bit salty or sour, the grounds are under-extracted, which can be remedied by a finer grind. But what if only some of your grounds are too coarse, and others are too fine – and maybe some are just right? Having uniform grind size throughout your brew basket makes it easier to isolate and adjust this variable in order to get the level of extraction you want. The only way to achieve that is with a burr grinder. Miller — as well as a handful of our other experts — recommends the Barazata Encore Coffee Grinder ($129).
Whole bean coffee that you grind yourself is preferable to pre-ground, too. The bean’s exterior traps and protects all of the delicate, volatile, and water-soluble oils that give coffee its flavor. As soon as you break the protective shell, it’s easy for the flavor to get contaminated, and much of the aroma escapes as soon as the oils are exposed to air.
An electric drip coffee maker can also be referred to as a dripolator. It normally works by admitting water from a cold water reservoir into a flexible hose in the base of the reservoir leading directly to a thin metal tube or heating chamber (usually, of aluminum), where a heating element surrounding the metal tube heats the water. The heated water moves through the machine using the thermosiphon principle. Thermally-induced pressure and the siphoning effect move the heated water through an insulated rubber or vinyl riser hose, into a spray head, and onto the ground coffee, which is contained in a brew basket mounted below the spray head. The coffee passes through a filter and drips down into the carafe. A one-way valve in the tubing prevents water from siphoning back into the reservoir. A thermostat attached to the heating element turns off the heating element as needed to prevent overheating the water in the metal tube (overheating would produce only steam in the supply hose), then turns back on when the water cools below a certain threshold. For a standard 10-12 cup drip coffeemaker, using a more powerful thermostatically-controlled heating element (in terms of wattage produced), can heat increased amounts of water more quickly using larger heating chambers, generally producing higher average water temperatures at the spray head over the entire brewing cycle. This process can be further improved by changing the aluminum construction of most heating chambers to a metal with superior heat transfer qualities, such as copper.
“I LOVE my Breville. I am a career barista. I have had this machine for almost a year now and waited to write a review until now so I wasn’t blinded by the initial excitement of purchasing a home espresso machine. I love to buy more expensive coffee from third-wave roasters, and this machine is so easy to dial in, I come away with professional shots almost every time. While this may be due to my experience in the shop, I will say that my husband is not a barista and picked up dialing in pretty fast using the Breville guides [that were] included. My only complaint is that the steaming wand is not the best. It takes a couple tries starting it up to get it going full blast some mornings, but I have always been able to achieve latte art. That is a very small complaint considering this machine is half the price of its competitors but still can create some awesome coffee. I’d highly recommend it for baristas on a budget.”
The Bunn 13300.0004 VP17-3SS2U Pourover commercial Coffee Brewer The Bunn 13300.0004 VP17-3SS2U Pourover commercial Coffee Brewer with Three Warmers One Lower and Two Upper in Stainless Steel is perfect for convenience stores family restaurants cafes or diners. Totally portable it can be used anywhere there's a plug. Just pour cold water in the top and coffee brews immediately ... More + Product Details Close
“So simple and easy to use. I’ve had the older version for ten years, tested out and researched so many to try something different only to return to this one, and I have no regrets. I LOVE IT! Most coffee makers put out a lot of steam at the top, which is unfortunate when stored under a cabinet. This has zero steam on top of the coffee maker. Also, most water reservoirs have a lid that flips open, which is also inconvenient when stored under a cabinet. This lid slides side to side, and brews a whole pot of coffee in about three minutes. Very convenient for busy, on-the-go, impatient people like me.”
This grinder produced the most even grounds out of all the machines I tested, and its range of output is all-encompassing. The coarsest setting produces large flakes, while the finest setting produces puffy grounds akin to powdered sugar—perfect for Turkish coffee. In between, I was quickly able to find the ideal settings for my Hario Woodneck, Aeropress, and even mason jar cold brew.
The Moccamaster isn't for everyone. Handmade in the Netherlands, it costs around $300—and would never win an award for value. It lacks a programmable timer, and it was also bit more difficult to set up than the rest of the coffee makers—in fact most were ready to go right out of the box. But a quick look at the instruction diagram should clear up any confusion, and the end result is well worth the effort.
Like the OXO machines, it has only one button on its interface. Unlike the OXO machines, that button does only one thing: start the brewing process. If you hold it down until it blinks, you’ll activate the pre-infusion; otherwise a simple click gets it going. Brewing a full pot of eight cups took us about seven minutes, by far the fastest of any of our top picks — which is a good thing, considering you can’t program it to start brewing before you wake up.
For all the coffee drinkers and aficionados who despise the long café lines, dread the overwhelming coffee options or need a fix for those early morning caffeine pains – fear no more! There’s finally an affordable, low-maintenance coffeemaker that can brew basic or premium-roast coffee in a fraction of the cost as the coffeehouse: The Two-Way Brewer. With stainless steel durability and twice the brewing options as other leading coffeemakers, the Two-Way Brewer doubles as a compact...

To ensure that our customers get the best coffee makers for their needs, our expert team here at Seattle Coffee Gear tests and reviews all items in our inventory. With us, you can be sure that you’re making a quality investment, no matter which coffee maker you choose. Use the links below for further assistance in the buying process, and shop with us today!

Buy from the experts. The team at Whole Latte Love has been selling coffee and espresso equipment since 1997. We have hundreds of videos and blog posts including product reviews, side-by-side comparisons, buying guides, and tech tips so you can shop with confidence. You can also take advantage of our encyclopedic knowledge of coffee on our Support Wiki.
The Mr. Coffee brand of coffee makers is a straightforward machine that is affordable. If you want something with more power that will consistently make a fantastic cup of coffee, consider the Zojirushi coffee maker with four warming plate settings that will let you make iced as well as hot coffee. Not only that, but it's a coffee maker that makes a statement on your counter.

Clean the inside of your machine by running water through it. Each machine will have a slightly different process, and some manufacturers provide tips and suggestions in user manuals. CoffeeLounge and other suggest mixing 2 oz. of vinegar in 20 oz. of water every now and then to clean out the machine even more thoroughly. After you use vinegar, though, be sure to rinse it three times with water to avoid any lingering vinegar taste in your next espresso.

This K-Elite Single-Serve K-Cup Pod Coffee Maker blend premium finish and programmable features together to deliver both modern design and the ultimate in beverage customization. It’s a stylish addition to any kitchen. Features strong brew setting when you want to brew a bolder cup of coffee, and an ice setting to brew hot over ice for a refreshing, full-flavored ice coffee.
If you’re shopping for coffee at the grocery store, “check the roast date, rather than the ‘best by’ date,” says Awan. With mass market roasters, the “best by” date can obfuscate the window in which coffee beans are at their best: about 4 days after roasting, when some, but not all, of the carbon dioxide has escaped from the beans. (Too much carbon dioxide captured within beans tends to create uneven extraction, as the gas escapes — this is what pre-infusing tries to counter. Conversely, too little carbon dioxide in the bean can lead to a loss of flavor.)
The Bonavita is a simple, compact machine (about 12 inches x 12 inches) for only $190, and it makes coffee that ranked in the top three in our taste test. Its philosophy seems to be “everything you absolutely need, nothing you don’t.” That means it’s SCAA-certified for water temperature and brew times, boasts pre-infusion capabilities, and has a flat-bottom filter basket that extracts grounds evenly. That’s it.
Here at the Strategist, we like to think of ourselves as crazy (in the good way) about the stuff we buy, but as much as we’d like to, we can’t try everything. Which is why we have People’s Choice, in which we find the best-reviewed (that’s four-to-five-star reviews and lots of ‘em) products and single out the most convincing. Here, the best coffee makers on Amazon, according to the people (note that reviews have been edited for length and clarity). Note that we’ve already talked to coffee snobs to find out their favorites, and also picked out the best espresso makers, too. And if you’re curious about coffee grinders, pour-over coffee set-ups and French-presses, we’ve got those as well.
The Moccamaster isn't for everyone. Handmade in the Netherlands, it costs around $300—and would never win an award for value. It lacks a programmable timer, and it was also bit more difficult to set up than the rest of the coffee makers—in fact most were ready to go right out of the box. But a quick look at the instruction diagram should clear up any confusion, and the end result is well worth the effort.

Percolators began to be developed from the mid-nineteenth century. In the United States, James H. Mason of Massachusetts patented an early percolator design in 1865. An Illinois farmer named Hanson Goodrich is generally credited with patenting the modern percolator. Goodrich's patent was granted on August 16, 1889, and his patent description varies little from the stovetop percolators sold today. With the percolator design, water is heated in a boiling pot with a removable lid, until the heated water is forced through a metal tube into a brew basket containing coffee. The extracted liquid drains from the brew basket, where it drips back into the pot. This process is continually repeated during the brewing cycle until the liquid passing repeatedly through the grounds is sufficiently steeped. A clear sight chamber in the form of a transparent knob on the lid of the percolator enables the user to judge when the coffee has reached the proper color and strength.

Drip-style coffee makers already have a bit of a flavor handicap when compared with other brewing methods, like pour-over and French press, which give coffee drinkers ultimate control over every aspect of the brewing (and therefore extraction) process. This makes it even more important to select a high-quality coffee bean for your at-home drip coffee maker. To learn more, we spoke with Saadat Awan at Woodcat Coffee in Los Angeles.

Looking for a coffee machine that revolves around your busy schedule? Wake up to the delicious aroma of freshly brewed coffee with the 24-hour digital timer that automatically gets your coffee ready for you. In a rush? Not to worry, the pause-and-serve function allows you to pour yourself a coffee partway through the brewing process without any drips or disruption. Perfect coffee should never be compromised. De’Longhi combination coffee espresso machines are carefully crafted for coffee lovers searching for a machine that achieves a harmony of excellence and convenience. Sleek, stylish and durable, a De’Longhi machine is at home in any kitchen.
“What I REALLY like about it is that it’s pretty much an all-in-one system without the thousand-dollar-plus all-in-one cost. I push one button and all the magic happens, and it’s quite entertaining to watch the espresso cascade through the milk and create separate layers. I also like that I can take the milk and store it in my fridge. I’ve done some temperature tests, and only noticed a five-degree increase after making a double latte, before I put it back in the fridge. This is nice, as you would think that to be so close to all that heat, it would be a much bigger temperature fluctuation.”
When you buy a machine with coffee credits you will receive a code with credits to buy coffee from curated roasters in the Spinn app. The credits will be uploaded in your account settings of the app. The credits allow for easy browsing and discovery of local and national coffee roasters. The credits will be used for automatically ordering when your Spinn machine is running low.
“I am a coffee snob, and one of my favorite things about traveling to Europe is their espresso and cappuccinos. A couple years ago, I bought a Nespresso Aeroccino machine for making froth and a stovetop Moka pot for making espresso; the system has worked fine, but the espresso can take awhile to make (around 5-8 minutes) and there’s definitely a learning curve to making good coffee with it. … [How] does this machine do [in comparison]? Stellar. Absolutely stellar. Once the water is in and it heats up, you flip up a lever, drop in the pod, and press the size button (espresso or lungo). Off it goes! Brewing is super quick and the espresso always comes out with a beautiful crema on top. My first drink was a cappuccino, and it was so much better than the ones I’ve been making with my Moka pot! …
“So simple and easy to use. I’ve had the older version for ten years, tested out and researched so many to try something different only to return to this one, and I have no regrets. I LOVE IT! Most coffee makers put out a lot of steam at the top, which is unfortunate when stored under a cabinet. This has zero steam on top of the coffee maker. Also, most water reservoirs have a lid that flips open, which is also inconvenient when stored under a cabinet. This lid slides side to side, and brews a whole pot of coffee in about three minutes. Very convenient for busy, on-the-go, impatient people like me.”
The next is the machine’s auto-pause. If you remove the carafe before your full pot is done brewing, the flow will stop until the carafe goes back in. It’s not a perfect system. There are a few inevitable drips that add an extra step to clean-up, and if the water is held up in the brew basket for too long, it increases the chance of over-extraction. But if you want a great first cup to sip on while the rest of your pot is brewing, you’ll get it in a much more satisfying time frame.